Swim Slower To Go Faster

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Making gains in your swimming is a constant battle, and this is not made any easier with so much conflicting information available. Add to this new go-faster devices and gadgets that promise to deliver fast swim times, and it can be extremely confusing for triathletes trying to improve their swim times. Dan Bullock looks at how swimming slower and learning good technique will help you swim faster in the long-term.

I know there’s lots of information out there and much of it is conflicting. I think it’s important to look at a balance of practical information and provide realistic guidelines. We all want to become faster, but in terms of swimming, I think it is important to learn to swim well at a slow pace first. The latest fad of giant pull buoys will please many by allowing faster less accurate swimming. It is also great at replicating swimming in a wetsuit, but this is lazy in terms of technique. You are covering up a multitude of issues in your front crawl that could be uncovered come race day if the temperature nudges up and it becomes a non-wetsuit swim.